Snails and Slugs

I do not find a single destructive smail in my garden. I do find a number of a new type of snail. This one is a flat spiral with a tube that does not get larger and the whole thing is at most some 3/8" in diameter. Is this the snail that feeds on other snails?

What I lack in snails though is made up for by huge numbers of slugs. These are rather small slugs but they are everywhere. What do the you use to control slugs?

I am looking for earth frienly solutions.

Ok for a earth friendly solution, diatomatious earth comes to mind. You will have to reapply after rain. Also check out www.gardensalive.com for biological and organic controls of almost anything.

puttyrat

Hunt them! DH made me a neat tool ..... it's just a long dowel that I can fit a razor blade onto at one end. I go around after a rain and chop 'em right in half. You'll never get them all but it helps keep the population down. I also read somewhere starlings are the only birds that will eat slugs so keep your bird feeder full to attract them.

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If you don't want to use beer, you can make a solution of 1 pkg of yeast, 1 quart warm (not hot) water and 1/2 cup of sugar. Put this in a margarine tub and bury to soil level. The nasty things are drawn to the yeast and crawl in and drown. Also make a spray of equal parts water and vinegar and spray them. It kills them and draws more in to spray them too.
Calalily

Think I'm following you around tonight Patty. How about something rough on the beds like grit!

Slugs. Mercy. George, don't know how big your garden is but copper will keep them out...even copper pipe that you can get at the dump. Of course now they make copper strips for snails at a premium price. Also crushed eggshells, available at your local feed store, work well and don't need to be re-applied after each rain (altho like puttyrat says DE works wonders also). Poppysue's tool and a flash lite at nite can be very useful and as much fun as watching tater bugs pop after you've dusted tater leaves w/rye flour! Lots of excitement in the garden! (By the way, DUCKS also eat slugs...it sure makes a sound tho to throw a slug to a duck and hear it go "schtmuck schtmuck schtmuck" as it wolfs it down!) By the way, I've tried the bowls of beer also! Works really good...UNTIL...until...you go out on a Sunday morning and find your neighbor, Bert, laid flat out in your garden oblivious to the fact that his tongue is exercising capillary action in the bottom of a beer bowl while slugs are clamoring up his face and into his ears...I reckon ol Bert really did have "one too many".

LMAO

I have a chicken that eats slugs. We go around during the day to where I know they sleep and I overturn things and she comes right along and snatches them up. We're a good team, her and I. Quality time as I tell her. She's happy. I'm happy.
Get yer self a chicken.
Janice

HAH! Janice, I need to teach my half-blind rooster, Wedda, that trick! Maybe I can tell him it's a small banana!

Wondering about the water and vinegar spray, would that harm the plants?
I sure need help with the little slimeballs... here in the pacific northwest they are everywhere, I've been putting out slug bait, but Ijust don't think it's quite doing the trick. I'd like tot ry to water and vinegar solution if it were safe for the plants.

I'd like to know about the water and vinegar spray too. I had such a terrible problem with those slimy critters last year. I hand picked them and dropped them in hot water. But they still got some of my plants good.

Forget Beer, waste of good beer to try & get those slimy creatures. The best thing I have found is ground up eggshells.

Everytime we use an egg, we wash out the shells & put them in an empty icecream bucket. I have trained my neighbours to save their breakfast eggshells for me. Then when I get enough I whizz them up in the cuisunart till they are little chunks of eggshells, not fine powder.

This I then scatter around my precious plants. Those pesky slimy creatures, slide across the eggshells and then get sliced to smithereens by the sharp shards of eggshells. Also eggshells will make your plant grow like crazy.

Totally natural, especiall if your hens have been eating the slugs like Janice says, 'what goes around, comes around'!

Hi all
The vinegar and water solution is safe on the plants. The slugs die like you put salt on them, but salt isn't safe to use in the garden. Haven't had any trouble with the vinegar and water so far. i think I got this out of Birds and Blooms or Organic Gardening and decided to try it. It is easier than emptying the traps, and almost as satisfying as cutting the slimy things in half like Poppysue.
Calalily

I had to laugh at this - my neighbors already think I'm a little nuts...they'll think I'm totally 'round the bend when I'm outside with a flashlight and a spray bottle of vinegar water! I think I'll try the crushed eggshell route first.

Horseshoe, somehow I suspect YOU'RE the one ".....laid flat out in your garden oblivious to the fact that his tongue is exercising capillary action in the bottom of a beer bowl while slugs are clamoring up his face and into his ears...."

MY WORD! I thought I'd wet my pants, I was laughing so hard when I read that! If you're not a comedy writer, you oughta be!!!

uh-ohhh...go_vols...you been a-peeking over my fence er sumpthin? Ummm, not at me, at that Bert guy, (some folks think we might be related cuz we are often confused by others.) (as far as I'm concerned I don't think it is the others that confuse us, that sort of thing just seems to come natural) ;>))

I just got 10 dozen eggs, yep - I sure did, I have been boiling them, scrambling them, frying them etc. my kids are going to hate eggs before all is said and done. I'm getting ready to wage war on the slimeballs........
I was wondering though, does it make a difference if the shells were from boiled eggs versus raw eggs?

I'll check back after the first battle

oh you must check out
http://www.tammyslug.com/

there are slug remedies- organic/chemicals/tricks slug jokes slug factoids, there's even a slug song
a great site for slug lovers and slug haters

interesting find. www.npr.org has a bunch of great links on their website this week for gardeners and even a gardening radio show. i guess spring is definitely in the air and none too soon.

Pebble I only use raw egg shells. But maybe cooked ones will work just as well?

Poppysue I have done as you do, chop them in half and leave the dead bodies lying around as a warning to all the other slimy creatures!

One can use grape juice in place of beer.

Vinegar is acidic. some plants don't like it.

A a border, if you can find it, try some ground oyster shells. Around here they are $7.29 for a 55lb bag.


Byron

hi i have lots of hostas,and had so many slugs i tried the beer in pie pan and it does work i hate picking up the pans but i just trough in bad and put in garbage, i got rid of a bunch dont know if they will return but im ready it sure did help

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Here's the thread...it actually started out about ladybugs and "evolved" into slugs. http://davesgarden.com/showthread/9154.html

Karma, I just KNEW you'd post on this thread - I was just mentioning it on another post before I saw your follow-up here.

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Now am I being insulted - a SLIME trail? I don't leave no stinking slime trail!!! Or was that a compliment - a SLIM trail (I don't leave one of those, either, LOL!!!!)

I'll just follow the trail of crushed egg shells to find you, Karma!

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